Caution: reimagining under wayTHERE is a through-the-looking-glass quality to the blue-lit tunnel that leads into the headquarters of Klarna, a Swedish online-payments firm. And there is something back-to-front about the company itself. It is a startup firm that grew up in Europe, and is now seeking to expand into America—the reverse of the usual pattern. Unlike most tech unicorns galloping to expand their market share, it already makes a profit. Even more strikingly, it plans to move from an area of financial ferment—mobile payments—into the sterile old business of retail banking. Investors are giddy about its plans, however unusual: a funding round last year valued the firm, whose name is Swedish for “getting clearer”, at $2.25 billion, up by almost a billion on the year before.
Klarna’s business “is quite basic”, says Sebastian Siemiatkowski, its founder and boss. Some 65,000 online merchants have so far hired it to run their checkouts. Its main appeal, for both retailers and their customers, is the simplicity of its system. Shoppers do not have to dole out credit-card details or remember a new password....Continue reading
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